that moved the tax hike needle to $400,000. no word on when the house might come back with time ticking away. democrats are hoping the scaled-back plan could get through the house, senate and white house before january 1st. sometime on december 30th, maybe even new year's eve is when they're probably going to get that deal done but let's go to jonathan allen, a senior washington correspondent for politico. the top headline on politico this morning, fiscal cliff deal increasingly unlikely. jonathan, really? >> i think there's a lot of pessimism here in washington. you've got, as you pointed out, five days left. i think the real indicator here is that none of these parties are moving off their position. the senate democrats, the house republicans, the white house. there hasn't been any reason for folks to look at what's going on and say, oh, i see where a deal could be coming together. so what you've got is what's described in economic game theory is where everyone has decided on their strategy, looked at the strategies of the oa